


The one where Emma is in a coma and Killian cares for her son.

by hannahhoppers



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU, Angst, Coma, F/M, Ficlet, Modern AU, car-crash, single parent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-01
Updated: 2016-07-01
Packaged: 2018-07-19 10:04:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7356871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannahhoppers/pseuds/hannahhoppers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based on the prompt "You need to wake up because I can't do this without you."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The one where Emma is in a coma and Killian cares for her son.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own the show or the characters, so I'm playing with them. Adam and Eddy have such nice toys. Unbeta'd. Kudos and comments if you enjoy!

_“It’s alright, Emma, you can do this!”_

 

_“No, no, I’m not ready. I’m just a kid!”_

 

_“Swan, look at me. Age is just a number. You_ can _do this.”_

 

_“Easy for you to say!”_

 

_Moments after they lapsed into silence, her little boy greeted the world. Wrapped in a blue cotton blanket, he was placed on his mother’s chest._

 

_“You did wonderfully, Swan,” he said, giving her a quick, platonic kiss on her forehead._

 

_“Oh, enough of that,” she said, before pulling him down and giving him a firm, happy kiss on the lips._

 

_“Are you sure, love?”_

 

_“Definitely.”_

 

He thought back to that moment as he bounced her son on his leg while filling out paperwork. They had been each other’s emergency contacts since she aged out of the system. And for the first time, that had mattered. She was driving to her apartment after picking Henry up from daycare when another car hit an ice patch and lost control of the vehicle, swerving into hers. When Killian received the call, his first thoughts went to Henry.

 

“And her son?” He had asked, frantically gathering his keys and wallet.

 

“The boy is fine, but his mother isn’t. She’s in an ambulance, they’re heading to Tuft’s Medical Center. We have the driver in custody and are watching over the child until somebody can come pick him up. The other parent, or a family member?”

 

“They don’t have family. I’ll come get him.”

 

“Just ask for Officer Dabney.”

 

“Thank you.” With that, he was driving to the scene. Slamming the door shut, he shouted for the officer placed in charge of Emma’s son. As the baby was placed in his arms, he bounced the child instinctively. “Hello, lad. You’ve had quite the scare, haven’t you?”

 

“You’re the boy’s father?”

“Not by blood, but for all intensive purposes, yes. I’m his secondary emergency contact, anyway.”

 

“I’ll leave him in your care, then. You’re able to get him where he needs to be?”

 

“Yes, I’ve a seat for him in my car,” he said, carrying the child to the car. As he strapped the boy into the rear-facing seat, he murmured, “let’s go find your mum.”

 

Now he was sitting in the ER waiting room, wailing tot on his knee, waiting for permission to see the woman he loved.

 

“Emma Swan?” called a nurse, clipboard in hand and hair tied back in a knot on the back of her neck. Killian nodded and stood. He walked down the hall numbly. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this. We had to put her on life support, she fell unconscious shortly after paramedics arrived at the scene and hasn’t woken up yet. Her left leg is broken and she’ll probably have to wear a neck brace for the next couple of weeks.”

 

“She’s in a coma?” Distraught, he dreamed up every possible scenario which could await him.

 

“It appears so, but the doctors are optimistic that she’ll wake up within the next several days.” She stopped in front of a door, labelled with a sign, reading 108E. “I’ll leave you to it. Just press the big blue call button if any of you need anything.”

 

“Thank you.” He stepped inside and closed the heavy door behind him. “Oh, Emma.”

 

Her lean frame looked flimsy, draped in a papery hospital gown and layered under cotton blankets. He brought the chair over to the right side of her bed and reached for her hand. He pressed a kiss against a scrape on the pale skin, then slid his thumb back and forth across the knuckles. “I don’t know if you can hear me, love. You were in a car crash. Another driver lost control of his vehicle and crashed right into the front of you. Your leg and neck were injured, and you’re in a coma.”

 

His attention was brought to the small boy on his lap. “Henry’s fine, by the way. Not a scratch on him.” The boy gurgled and Killian set him atop his mother’s chest, mirroring the image he had seen not many months ago in this same hospital. He listened to the pings and beeps of her monitors, blue and green lines going up and then down again in unchanging patterns. He let the minutes pass as he murmured the terrors which had been gnawing at him for the past few hours. A nurse came in to tell him that visiting hours were over, he had to go home.

 

“Alright, then. Thank you.” The nurse nodded and left, allowing him to see his own way out. “I’ll be back again tomorrow, love,” he hummed, kissing Emma’s forehead before scooping up her child. The boy was asleep.

 

He took the baby to his apartment, setting him up in the portable crib kept in the living room. “Goodnight, Henry.” With that, he went to his own bedroom to sleep restlessly (but dreamlessly) through the night. When he awoke the next morning, he prepared a breakfast of eggs and toast for himself and a bottle of formula for Henry. Finding an outfit for the child took a bit of digging around, but he found one with the extra diapers he kept for if Emma needed him to babysit. If Emma didn’t wake up soon, he’d have to stop by her apartment to get some of Henry’s things.

 

On the way to the hospital, he stopped to pick up a vase of buttercups to liven up the room. The baby was quiet on the drive, perhaps sensing the seriousness of what was going on.

 

“Oh, Emma, please wake up? For me? For Henry?” The blue spikes on the screen sharpened a bit, peaking a little higher and coming a little faster. “I know I’m not being fair. I’m sure you’d wake up if you could. I just- wish you were here. That’s all.” He lay the infant across his mother’s chest once more and continued to talk, pretending as if the woman were carrying on the conversation with him. He kept on with this until he was, once again, asked to leave for the night.

 

And so he established a routine. _Wake up, make breakfast, wake up Henry, get ready, get Henry ready, pick up flowers, visit Emma, go home, eat dinner, go to bed._ He’d tell the comatose woman about his and Henry’s days, about something a coworker or friend had said on the phone, about a new song he had heard on the radio. He began working online, from the plastic chair next to the hospital bed. He had begun moving more and more of Henry’s things from her little downtown apartment to his larger one. It continued for two months.

 

“It’s nearly Christmas, love. All I want is for you to wake up. Just wake up, and we can play in the snow with your boy and drink all the hot cocoa with cinnamon that you want. Just wake up, Emma.” Henry started to stir and whimper. “God, Swan. Henry. He’s getting so big. I think he might start talking, soon. I’ve started feeding him that jarred baby food. He loves the banana, who knew?” He bounced the boy on his leg, checking to make sure the diaper was clean. “I feel like a single parent, Emma. I know I’m not his father, we never really talked about it, but…” When Henry calmed he placed him back atop his mother. “It’s so hard. You need to wake up because I can't do this without you. I can’t raise your son on my own. I love him like he is, but the child needs his mother. He needs you, Swan. _I_ need you.” Nothing happened. Nothing changed. The blue and green lines followed the same pattern they’d been following since that first night, the machine tones continued sounding out loudly, clearly, cruelly. “It’s getting late, love. I have to get home and get Henry to bed. I’ll be back tomorrow.” He kissed her forehead and collected the boy, before driving home in silence.

 

The next day, he was met with a miracle. Emma, eyes open and tracking the light the doctor shone at them.

 

“Killian?”

 

“Emma.” The doctor stepped out of his path as he barreled across the room to hug the woman he had watched sleep for nearly 10 weeks.

 

“And Henry, oh, you’re so big!”

 

“I told you, last night, that he was.”

 

“I heard. Every word of it. I think I would’ve lost my mind if you didn’t talk to me.”

 

“Every day, I was just hoping… It’s a Christmas miracle, that’s what it is.”

 

“Here I am,” she smiled, tears in her eyes. “Just like before.”

 

“We need to get you home, love. Out of this gown and this place.”

 

“Agreed.”

 

And so, a few hours later, he pushed her out of the building she had lived in for two months, her son in her arms and his hands firmly gripping the handles of the wheelchair. They got in his van and clasped hands over the center console. He didn’t have to do anything without her anymore. She had woken up.

**Author's Note:**

> I realized that I didn't give a lot of context. Just so everybody's clear:
> 
> Emma and Killian grew up together as best friends. He aged out of the system a few years before her, and she went on the run. While she was running, she met Neal and all of that crap happened, but she told the cops what happened and Neal got arrested instead of her. She got an honest job and kept Henry, and she and Killian began dating the day her son was born. She lived in a crappy apartment downtown, and he Killian lived in a better/nicer/larger one in a nicer part of the city. Henry was ~3 months old when the car crash happened.
> 
>  
> 
> Also, Tuft's Medical Center is a real hospital in downtown Boston.
> 
> Also, if a person had been in a coma for two months, they wouldn't be talking and leaving the hospital and holding babies as soon as they woke up. She'd likely not be able to move or speak, and might not remember things, but I bended facts for the sake of story. A&E did that with David, though, so it's alright, I'd say. :)


End file.
